[Better understanding and treatment of paranoid and somatization clinical pictures in Nigerians]. / Zum besseren Verständnis und zur Behandlung von Paranoia und Somatisierungserscheinungen bei Nigerianern.

This work identified an important attitude of Nigerians namely that behaviour is controlled from outside including deviant behaviour. Furthermore, there is always some external situation which has some relationship, no matter how remote to mental illness. On the other hand very often psychic distress is often communicated through the body. There is an unconscious link between somatic complaint and the underlying psychological and social problem. Most types of mental illness in Nigeria are expressed through the body and are felt to be caused from outside. A psychological model is described which makes conscious the link between the bodily discomfort and the underlying social or psychological problem. The model also tries to find the outside situation which is attributable to present mental illness. Through social work the problem can be resolved or through psychotherapy accepted as unchangeable and real.

Socio-economic status and mental disorder--profile of a Nigerian psychiatric inpatient population.

A study of the socio-economic and diagnostic profile of psychiatric patients treated at a mental hospital in Nigeria over a period of six months was conducted. Schizophrenia, organic psychosis, and mental sub-normality were found to have been diagnosed more often among under privileged persons from lower socio-economic classes; while affective disorder (manic depression) and neurotic illness were commoner among persons from economically more fortunate higher social classes. Males exceeded females in the cohort and the patients generally exhibited upward social mobility when compared with their parents. Possible socio-cultural factors contributing to the findings have been discussed. A suggestion is made for a more elaborate field work to study the relationship between socio-economic class and psychopathology in a developing country like Nigeria.